Manx Loagthan Sheep

Carrying on with my British Breeds project my next breed is the Manx Loaghtan (pronounced Loch-tun) and is believed to be derived from a combination of Gaelic words, either lugh dhoan (mouse brown) or lhosht dhoan (burnt brown). Either could be true given the natural colour of this breed of sheep, a soft shade of brown that is called "moorit" and ranges from fawn to dark reddish brown.

As with most sheep, especially the coloured varieties, sunlight does tend to bleach the tips of the locks and makes the sheep look lighter in colour than the rest of the fleece.

This Manx Loaghtan has just been sheared and clearly shows a much darker colour fleece.

The Manx Loaghtan sheep, at the time of writing, is in the "At Risk" category, according to the Rare Breeds Survival Trust.  This means that there is between 900 and 1500 sheep of this breed registered with the relevant breed society.  According to the British Wool Marketing Board the breed was established in the UK during the 11th century.

Historically they are native to The Isle of Man, hence the name "Manx" and the soft brown "moorit" colour that the breed is well known for today used to be the rare colour, with white, grey and black being the dominant colours.  All that changed during a period of near extinction in the 1950's where numbers were reduced to just 43 individual sheep and now the "moorit" brown seems to be the only colour that has survived that event, although the lambs are born black and turn brown within a few weeks of birth.  There are a few small flocks of this breed outside of the Isle of Man but they are niche grazers and so the right grazing conditions need to be met in order to keep this breed.

Numbers fell by the 1950's due to the introduction of other hill breeds to the Isle of Man and despite efforts to save the breed it is not out of danger yet.  Some of these efforts have included the cancellation of the famous Isle of Man TT races (Tourist Trophy motorcycle races) in 2001, the year of a major outbreak of Foot-and-Mouth disease in the UK, which surrounds the Isle of Man but does not govern it.  Despite the fact that they had only ever previously been cancelled during WWII, since they started in 1907, and the fact that the races are very important to the economy of the self governing island bringing in approximately 40,000 visitors to the island to see the races, the islands government felt the risk to the sheep of contracting the disease from unwitting tourists was far too great to hold the event that year.  Also, in 2009, the European Union recognised the breed with a "Protected Designation of Origin" which is designed to help reconnect farmers with consumers and raise awareness of a unique product, crop or animal.

The Manx Loaghtan is a long legged, fine boned, very hardy primitive breed usually sporting 2 or 4 horns in both sexes and is one of the Northern European Short-Tailed breeds and are valued for conservation grazing as they like rough grazing such as hawthorn and coarse grasses, which then encourages native plants and wildflowers to return and studies on the Isle of Man, Ramsey Island and Bardsey Island show that there appears to be a connection between the presence of Manx Loaghtan and the ability of the Chough to survive.  As they graze and crop the vegetation it gives the birds access to surface-active and soil insects.  The dung they leave behind also attracts beetles and fly larvae which in turn are a food resource for the birds when the ground is hard or other insects are scarce.  When Manx Loaghtan numbers increase, so to Chough numbers, when they decrease the bird population also decreases.

Manx Loaghtan are a small breed of sheep with no wool on their dark face and legs.  They produce a smallish fleece that is in high demand with hand spinners.  Depending on the source of information, the staple length is between 2.5 and 5 inches long (6.5-13 cm long) and can be anything from 1.4-2.5 kilos in weight. 

This fleece can be picked and carded or you can comb if its long enough to.  Personally I go with wool combs all the way as that is my preferred choice of preparation as I prefer to spin worsted style over woollen style and I have never gotten the hang of hand carding. I really must get some proper tuition as its a little embarrassing for a hand spinner not to be able to card, if I can stand the noise of the process as I do find the noise of carding a little hard to bare.  

The Manx Loaghtan fleece can be overdyed but the base colour must be taken into account when choosing a colour.  There are two types of fleece within the breed, not on the same animal, one hairy and one woolly with the hairy one being more durable and the woolly one being much softer but it does have a good amount of bounce.  Its at its best when made into relative lightweight fabrics.  

I have bought this breed in as pre-prepared fibre from a fellow spinners de-stash back in May 2020 but the fibre was produced in 2013 by a supplier that I am familiar with.  The general consensus is that fibre deteriorates with age but I personally have rarely found this to be true.  What I did find with this fibre though were lots of small clumps of "rubbish" that, in my opinion, should not have made it into the finished braid of fibre and I had to remove this as I progressed and this meant that my finished yarn was 6g lighter due to the removal of the rubbish.

Spun to Sport Weight my finished yarn is 94g/251m

My finished yarn is lovely and soft and quite bouncy and I do love the unusual shade of brown.  My knitted piece for the project only took 22g/57m, which shows the difference in density with the Cotswold which used 22g/42m.  This difference in density could be attributed to the difference in the breeds fibres or it could be attributed to the difference in my spinning, as I am human and not a regimented machine.